It All Started with a Big Bang
by theredrobin
Summary: Defending a paper on emergence? Child's play. Interpreting quantum mechanics formulas? Nothing to it. Exercising basic social skills? Er…
1. The Plot Simulacrum

Author's Notes

This is a collection of the random ideas for snapshot stories and "lost scenes" that have been floating around in my brain. The chapters won't be in any kind of consecutive order on their own, but I'll indicate which season and episode each scene is supposed to happen in.

* * *

**The Plot Simulacrum**

_Continuity: Season 3, sometime between "The Maternal Congruence" and "The Psychic Vortex."_

* * *

"I've just found my new favorite movie."

Leonard rolled his eyes. He and the others were just coming back from the premiere of _Avatar _and were climbing the staircase to the apartment. Penny agreed to come along, but he was pretty sure she had been freaked out by the diehard fanatics who had come in costume, blue body-paint, pointy prosthetic ears, and all; she'd been pretty quiet on the ride back. "You say that about every movie we go watch, Howard."

"I never meant it before. I do now," Howard said resolutely. "_Avatar_ is my absolute favorite movie of all time."

"Uh-huh. And what happened to _Star Trek?_"

"That's completely diff—"

"_The Dark Knight_?"

"Well, I mean—"

Raj whispered something to Leonard.

"Yeah, and what about _Iron Man_?"

Sheldon interrupted. "For once, I agree with Howard. James Cameron has set the bar in the filmmaking industry. I don't really see the point in anyone else trying. Outside of established franchises, it's by far more visually impressive and stimulating than anything I've ever seen before."

They had reached the apartment door, and Leonard fished his keys from out of his coat pocket and let them all inside. As they settled into comfortable positions around the living room, Sheldon continued to rattle off the reasons why _Avatar_ surpassed all other movies while Howard nodded his head in approval.

"—and of course it was all nicely tied together with an engaging plot—"

"Oh, _that's_ it!"

Leonard, Sheldon, Raj, and Howard turned to look at Penny, from whom the exclamation had come, startling them all. It was the first thing she had said since the credits rolled.

"Something's been bugging me the whole time we were watching that movie, and I just realized what it was: I've seen that storyline before."

Howard shook his head. "No way."

"Impossible," Sheldon denied.

"It's true!"

"A claim like the one you have the audacity to make needs irrefutable proof."

"Fine," said Penny, getting up from the couch. "I'll show you. Tomorrow night, I'll bring you all the proof you want." And she walked out of the apartment and went across the hall.

"But tomorrow night is laundry night."

)(

"She's late."

"It's 8:32, Sheldon."

"And we agreed she would arrive at 8:30."

Leonard sighed and stared up at the ceiling.

"I say she made the whole thing up," Howard said, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

"I believe her," shrugged Raj. "Why would Penny lie?"

"To be a proverbial thorn in my side," Sheldon answered matter-of-factly.

"Like I don't have better things to do."

Penny was standing in the open doorframe, a plastic Blockbuster bag swinging from her arm.

"You're late," said Sheldon by way of greeting.

Penny rolled her eyes, shut the door, and made for the DVD player. Cracking open one of two DVD cases she pulled out of the bag, she popped in a disc and left everything else on the coffee table before going to lounge on the couch next to Leonard.

Howard snatched up the abandoned DVD cases at the same time a castle and written scrawl materialized on the otherwise blue television screen to the accompaniment of a short strain of music. "Disney?" his voice rang out incredulously.

"Yes."

"You honestly are coming in here with—" Howard lifted up what he held in his hands for the others to see. "—_Pocahontas_ and _Atlantis: The Lost Empire_ to compare them with _Avatar_?"

Sheldon gave Penny a look from his spot on the couch like one would have while indulging a petulant child. "This is absurd!"

"Have any of you ever watched these movies before?" Penny asked evenly.

Raj mutely shook his head.

Leonard thought he had, years and years ago, but before he had a chance to say so, Sheldon bristled, "I am a lauded theoretical physicist. I possess a master's degree, two PhDs, and have an IQ of 187. Of course I haven't."

"Uh, no," Howard answered succinctly, as if it was silly of her to even ask.

"Well then shut up, watch, and talk to me in three hours."

)(

It was approximately two minutes into the credits of the second film before anyone spoke. Even in the dim light, Leonard could tell that Penny was smirking smugly, as she had been since the middle of the first movie.

"I don't—how—what the _frak_?" Howard spluttered.

"I think that's Howard's way of saying you were right, Penny," Leonard said dryly.

Howard turned away from the screen to face them, still looking very much like someone had just proven to him the moon was, in fact, made of cheese. "I can't believe the greatest movie of all time is nothing more than a rip off of," he cringed as if the word on his tongue was bitter, "_Disney_. How has no one realized this?"

"Uh," said Penny, pointing to herself, "I did."

"_Avatar_ is a derivative work!" suddenly erupted from Sheldon. "Cameron has the gall to call that hokum innovative?"

"I told you," Penny answered in a sing-song voice, revealing just how much she was enjoying this moment and the fact that she was right.

By that point, Sheldon was really becoming incensed. "He's no better than an experimental physicist!"

"Hey!" Leonard protested.

Sheldon ignored him. "That vapid idiot made me incorrect. Opposing_ Penny_. James Cameron, you've just secured yourself a place on my all-time enemy list. A relegation is in order for Billy Sparks."

With that, he stalked off to the back of the apartment.

"What are you doing?" Leonard called after him.

"Composing a strongly-worded letter of disappointment and censure to James Cameron!"

* * *

End Author's Notes

Walt Disney is greater than James Cameron.


	2. The Maternal Analogizing

Author's Notes

Loving the fourth season already.

* * *

**The Maternal Analogizing**

_Continuity: Season 2, just before "The Maternal Capacitance."_

* * *

Leonard let himself into the apartment, shrugged off his bag, and threw himself facedown onto the couch. Maybe if he lay there long enough, he could figure out a way to accomplish time travel and prevent his past-self from answering his cellphone earlier today without even checking the caller ID. Or maybe sometime in the next ten minutes, the floor beneath him would suffer a gravitational collapse, form a black hole, and swallow him whole.

One of those was bound to happen.

"You're in my spot."

Leonard lifted his head slightly, his glasses askew, and stared up at Sheldon, who was hovering expectantly over him with a container of Chinese food in hand. Grumbling a little, he pushed himself upright, whereupon Sheldon immediately sat down and began to eat, but did not stray farther than that. That black hole might just be slow in coming.

"What's the matter with you?" Howard asked as he walked over from the kitchen.

"My mother is coming to town," Leonard groaned, burying his head into the throw-pillow he had hugged against his chest.

"That bad, huh?"

"You have no idea," his voice coming out a little muffled.

"What, are you joking?" said Howard, not at all sympathetically. "Have you met the harridan that is my mother?"

"You don't understand," Leonard sighed as he resurfaced. "_Your_ mother actually treats you like you're her son. _Mine_ is under the impression I was born to be her test subject."

"All mothers exhibit that kind of Machiavellian behavior in some form on their progeny," declared Sheldon. "For example, my mother seemed to think that if she forcibly dragged me to church every Sunday, I would be transformed into a God-fearing zealot of superstitious mythology."

Raj flopped into the lounger. "I only ever speak to my mother through the internet," he said around a mouthful of chicken lo mein. "That way, if she starts lecturing me for the thousandth time about why she has no grandchildren yet, I can literally press the mute button. It's beautiful. I highly recommend it."

"A mute button," Howard said dreamily. "If only. The closest thing I have to that for my mother is Manischewitz and valium."

Sheldon reflected thoughtfully, "Theoretically, it wouldn't be incredibly difficult to produce a depressant that paralyzes the vocal chords temporarily, i.e. a 'mute button' of sorts, if you will."

"Are you serious?" Howard said, becoming morbidly excited.

"I most certainly am serious." Sheldon frowned. "Are anthropologically-established norms suggesting my mannerisms indicate otherwise?"

Leonard lurched to his feet. "Well thanks, guys," he said as he headed for his room, "you've all been really supportive while I'm in the middle of a crisis over here."

"You're welcome," Sheldon replied.

Pausing to consider if he should take the time to point out to Sheldon that he was being sarcastic, Leonard decided his time would be more usefully spent quietly banging his head on the desk in his room. Which he proceeded to in fact do.

* * *

End Author's Notes

Insanely short, I know, but I had to get it out of my system.


	3. The Naiad Aggravation

Author's Notes

I don't even know where the hell this came from.

* * *

**The Naiad Aggravation**

_Continuity: Season 2, sometime between "The Codpiece Topology" and "The Barbarian Sublimation."_

* * *

"_Hullo! Watch out!" _

"Oh my God, oh my God, shut _up_!" Raj hissed at the screen while he furiously mashed buttons to escape the strangling chokehold of a ReDead. It was too late, however. The last of the heart containers drained, and Link collapsed onto his knees and then keeled to the floor as bold black and red letters spelling out _Game Over_ announced defeat.

"My turn!" Howard crowed, seizing the clunky, three-pronged controller from Raj's slack grip so enthusiastically that he nearly dislodged the cord connecting it to the console.

Wednesday night had found the four boys in Sheldon and Leonard's apartment, where a conversation that began about microchips and somehow morphed into a heated discussion about classic video games led to Raj admitting that he'd never played _Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time_. Leonard, Sheldon, and Howard were adamant that this atrocity be rectified immediately, pulled out the Nintendo 64, and four hours of playing brought them here.

"That little bitch distracted me!" cried Raj in disgust, pointing an accusing finger at Navi, Link's fairy.

Supposedly your character's ally, the game had been punctuated with constant interruptions from the ball of light that was Navi as she shouted things like '_Hullo! Listen!_' to get his attention. Raj found she would often even bring time-sensitive missions and battles to an outright standstill if he ignored her too long just so Link, and by extension the player, could listen to her advice, usually about something he'd figured out a good half an hour ago.

"Yeah, she does that," replied Howard with a smirk, punching the yellow arrow pad in a memorized pattern so he could summon his horse Epona with the ocarina. "I can't tell you how many times I wished I could just dump her somewhere in the Lost Woods."

Leonard cocked his head to the side. "Does anyone else find it interesting that the only girl who has ever repeatedly—and voluntarily—thrown herself at Howard is the one girl he wishes wouldn't?"

Raj snorted and took a long pull on his can of soda.

"She _is_ more of a hindrance than a help," Sheldon conceded. "It's not surprising. The ancient Greek and Roman cultures often portrayed naiads as troublesome little miscreants in their mythology." He paused. "Although, I doubt they had the foresight to know that reputation would extend to video games."

"_Hey! Look!"_

They turned their attention back to the screen, where Link was currently being pursued and receiving a serious beating from…a flock of chickens.

"_Listen! Watch out!"_

"For crying out loud, I know, woman, I know!" Howard snapped as he tried to have Link seek sanctuary in the first unlocked cottage he came across.

But the chickens were having none of it. Squawking and flapping in blind, homicidal rage, they flung themselves at Link, causing him to yell in pain and be hurled to the ground while inflicting serious damage to his health.

"Are you kidding me, Howard?" said Leonard in a voice dripping with disbelief. "With all the things to do in this game, you chose to antagonize livestock?"

"And in direct violation of the shechita," Sheldon noted disparagingly. "If you choose to associate yourself with some chimerical doctrine like a primitive being, then at least have the decency to abide by it."

Howard offered no answer as he desperately struggled to flee, but it was a lost cause. Link ended up dying a surprisingly violent death where chickens are concerned and was restored back to the start point in the Temple of Time.

It was then that Navi swiftly chirped, _"Look! Hullo!"_

With a sudden surge of resentment, Howard let out a growl and had Link lunge at Navi. His fingers stumbling haphazardly across the buttons, through a sequence of jerky motions he managed to inadvertently bring up the inscription engraved on the Spiritual Stone pedestal and play "Saria's Song" on the ocarina. And then…

"Holy crap." Leonard's mouth fell open.

Navi was no longer hovering over Link's head like some perverse halo. Howard had moved him well across the Temple, but she was nowhere nearby. When he brought the viewpoint camera to look back and inspect the area near the pedestal, there she was, drifting in a lazy circle…no longer following Link.

The four of them sat in stunned silence for a moment.

"I'm a _genius_!" Howard announced.

"Hardly," said Sheldon. "Might I remind you that you are the only person sans a doctorate occupying this room?"

"No, no, I won't let you ruin this for me. Tonight, I am a god among mortals. Or at the very least, I deserve an extra turn."

Leonard shrugged his acquiescence.

Sheldon narrowed his eyes to slits and then after a moment grudgingly muttered, "Agreed."

When a few minutes of unnatural quiet passed, Raj rubbed his chin in consideration. "You know, I kind of miss her. Clap your hands if you believe!" He started to applaud.

Leonard laughed. "That's for Tinkerbell, Raj."

Howard rolled his eyes, but was too intent on riding on horseback through Gerudo Valley to do anything else.

"There's a heart piece in the crate on that ledge. Get it," Sheldon ordered impatiently.

"It's my turn, I'll do what I want!"

But as Howard turned away from the screen, the distraction cost him as he accidentally sent Epona trampling over a lone, grazing chicken.

Not a second later, a blood-thirsty death crow rang out.

"Damn it, Sheldon!"

* * *

End Author's Notes

_Legend of Zelda_ fans, anyone? Anyone?

Believe it or not, Navi is so annoying, players have actively searched for and discovered ways to ditch her during gameplay. Oh, and it's also true that the chickens will attack with a vengeance when provoked.

…I think my nerd is showing.


	4. The Juvenile Quandary

Author's Notes

This popped into my head after seeing a few abused-looking _Star Wars_ action figures on the side of the road and just mutated.

* * *

**The Juvenile Quandary**

_Continuity: Anytime during Season 4_

* * *

Later, Penny could only chalk it up to an act of desperation. Or a momentary lapse of sanity.

Her sister Rachel and her youngest son Tyler had come into town to stay with her for the week. The visit had gone surprisingly smooth until the last day. Rachel wanted some time for herself and left Tyler to Penny, which Penny had no problem with.

First thing Saturday morning, Rachel borrowed Penny's car and headed out to Amadeus Salon and Spa. As for Penny, she was just settling onto the couch to drink her coffee when the phone rang.

)(

Penny knocked on the apartment door harder and longer than she usually would.

It finally swung open to reveal Sheldon clutching a bowl of cereal. "It's rather early for a social visit, Penny. You're interrupting _Dr. Who_."

She blew a hank of hair out of her eyes. "Can I talk to Leonard?"

"You can." He didn't move.

"Well can you go get him?" Penny said impatiently. "Or let me inside?"

"Leonard isn't here."

"You just said—"

"I know what I said. I said you can talk to him, and you can, unless you suddenly contract a severe strain of laryngitis. That's what you asked. You didn't ask if Leonard was present in the apartment, which he isn't."

She suppressed the urge to hit him and ground out, "Where _is_ Leonard?"

"He drove to San Diego Thursday night for the Physics and Chemistry of Surface and Interfaces conference. I decided not to go because they are simply rehashing old theories and pretending they're ground-breaking. I hardly think it worth my time to pander to such—"

As Sheldon continued to explain in unsolicited detail just how useless attending the conference would have been for him, Penny was certain the pounding behind her left eye was going to develop into a migraine. What was she going to do now? She'd been counting on Leonard to help her out, but that was out the window. She was screwed. Unless…

"Sheldon," she interrupted him. "Work called and asked me to cover a few shifts today at the last minute. I couldn't say no because I've been late every day for the past three weeks—"

"I hope punctuality isn't an ability you boast on your resume."

Penny pointedly ignored him. "—but now I have a problem."

"How so? You should be grateful they still want you at all. Aren't you always saying how you need more money? Generally, working more alleviates that particular predicament."

"You don't say."

"…sarcasm?"

She took a deep breath. She had to be out of her mind. "I'm supposed to be babysitting my nephew."

He blinked.

"Right now," she emphasized to help him understand.

"Ah, that is quite the dilemma. Good luck!"

"Sheldon!"

"Yes, Penny?"

Why did he have to make everything so difficult? "I _have_ to go to work," she said deliberately.

"So you said before."

"And since I have to go, I need someone to watch Tyler for me."

Sheldon was quiet.

"Will you watch Tyler for me?" Penny said, spelling it out for him.

"Oh," he seemed mildly surprised, as if he genuinely hadn't known that this was the direction the conversation was headed in. "No."

"Please, Sheldon?" she begged. "Please, please, please? It's only for a couple of hours."

"In that case…"

Her face lit up.

"…no."

He was even starting to close the door when Penny thought of something. "I invoke the favor thingy of our friendship covenant!"

Slowly, the door opened again.

"Drat."

)(

"How old is it?"

Penny gently put down a sleeping Tyler on the couch, covering him with the blanket she'd taken from his playpen. "_He_'s three."

She hadn't been able to convince Sheldon to go and watch Tyler at her place, so instead she packed a bag of toys and books along with some food and anything else he could possibly need while she was gone.

"Tyler should sleep for at least another half hour. Feed him the dry cereal and juice for breakfast, and the easiest thing for lunchtime is a grilled cheese sandwich. I'll be back to give him dinner, okay?"

"What do I do when I'm done feeding it?"

"Just…just give him a few of his toys to play with," Penny told him, raising an eyebrow. Had Sheldon never been around children before? "He loves those Sing-a-ma-jig puppets the best. They should keep him busy for a while."

Checking her watch, she started for the door. "I have to go. Thanks for doing this, Sheldon."

When Sheldon didn't answer, she turned around to find him staring at Tyler as though he expected him to spontaneously burst into flame at any given moment. For a split second she wondered if she was doing the right thing leaving Tyler here, but she quickly dismissed her worrying. The guy was literally a genius. Surely he could handle a toddler?

)(

It was six o'clock by the time Leonard climbed the stairs up to the apartment, and he was exhausted after the two hour drive from San Diego. Unlocking the front door, he tossed his keys into the bowl and slung his bag from off his shoulder, paying little attention to anything else as he did.

"_Laaaaa!_"

"What the—?" Leonard jumped back slightly and looked to the floor from where the noise had come. Near his shoe was a stuffed blue…rabbit? Bear? Whatever misconstrued crossbreed the thing was meant to be, it was stuffed into a miniature pullover sweater and had clearly been the source of the noise because as he squeezed it again, its little mouth opened wide to reveal a little pink tongue and release another "_Laaaaa!_"

"Tyler, is that—oh, Leonard. You're home."

Looking up to face Sheldon, Leonard's own mouth fell open.

The apartment was, in a word, wrecked. There were books, clothes, a lamp, papers, and God only knew what else strewn everywhere. The hydrogen atom model was in pieces all over the hardwood floor. Sheldon's dry-erase board had been knocked to the floor and the majority of the Schwarzschild black hole radius equations that had covered it were now supplanted by smiley face and a flower. A faint, acrid smell bore testament to what upon further inspection of the charred, black mess burning in a pan on the stove Leonard could only assume had once been a grilled cheese sandwich. One of the seat cushions was detached from the couch and leaning casually up against the fridge. Also attached on the fridge was the apartment flag of a gold lion on a field of azure. It was upside-down.

"What the hell happened?"

Sheldon gave an answer that he clearly believed to be not only adequate, but comprehensible. "I was coerced into accommodating what I suspect to be akin to the illegitimate spawn of Lex Luthor and Talia Al Ghul!"

Leonard looked at him blankly for a moment. "_What?_"

"The child did all of this!"

Blurting the first thing that came to mind, he said, "Oh my God, Sheldon, if you're experimenting on human subjects—"

Sheldon cut across him. "I was watching Penny's nephew." He paused. "I seem to have misplaced him."

More than a little bewildered, Leonard simply stood there before the significance of what Sheldon had said sunk in. "Penny left—she trusted—you_ lost_ Penny's nephew?" he spluttered.

"Technically speaking, I left him to his own devices in your room and he vanished."

"Sheldon, how old is he?"

"Penny said three."

Leonard raked his fingers through his hair. "You left a three-year-old alone?"

"He did _what_?"

Sheldon and Leonard whipped around to find Penny standing in the still wide-open doorway wearing her Cheesecake Factory uniform.

"What happened here? Leonard?" Her expression was caught between shock and panic. "Where is he, Sheldon? Where's Tyler?" she asked more urgently.

There was a small stretch of silence before Sheldon found his voice. "Somewhere in the apartment."

Penny's eyes narrowed. "Where exactly?"

"I have yet to determine that."

Her face went a shade paler. "Sheldon! I knew I was crazy to leave him with you. Oh my God!" She buried her face in her hands. Leonard made a tentative motion to go and comfort her, but before he'd even taken two steps, her head came flying back up, her eyes dry and blazing. "How did this happen?"

"He ran off when I left him in Leonard's room."

"Alone?" she asked in a hard voice, though she already knew the answer.

Finally getting the sense that this had not been a good move, Sheldon hesitated before saying, "Yes."

If looks could kill, his safely was not to be guaranteed by any means in that moment.

He tried to defend himself. "You said to feed him and leave him with toys. You never said I had to keep him by my side ad infinitum or he would go insane."

"I thought the watching part was implicit!" Penny snarled. "Why the hell else wouldn't I just leave him in my apartment alone? Although let me tell you, I think he might have been better off that way!"

"Penny!"

The sound of raised voices had tempted Tyler out from his hiding place, and at the sight of his aunt, he scampered on stout legs to her. Dropping to her knees, Penny wrapped her arms around him and quickly scooped him up.

Sheldon, however, was far too preoccupied with where Tyler had come from. "Were you in my room?"

Leonard could practically see him twitching.

Tyler shyly hid his dimpled smile in the crook of Penny's neck so that only his mass of blond curls was visible. This seemed to be all the affirmative answer Sheldon required, and he sped toward the back of the apartment. The explosive and deceptively high-pitched sound of a shout pierced the air moments after he disappeared. The second Leonard saw him marching back, arms full of ripped cardboard, chunks of plastic casing, and some memorabilia, he knew what had happened and winced. Penny, however, did not understand, nor did she care.

"Look at this!" he said, gesturing with his chin at what to her looked like trash. "He removed almost every collectible _Star Wars_ figure and all my first edition comic books from their original packaging!"

"You lost my nephew," she said emphatically, daring him to even try to compare one to the other.

He did dare, of course, but as Sheldon opened his mouth to retort, Penny held up one hand to stop him while she balanced Tyler on her hip with the other. "No, this is my fault. I don't know what I could have possibly been thinking to expect you to be able to handle this. My mistake."

"Well, as long as we're agreed."

Leonard thought she might have strangled Sheldon right then if she hadn't been holding Tyler.

Instead, she just let out a long sigh. "Come on, sweetie. Let's get you a bath."

To everyone's surprise, as she started to head for her apartment, Tyler threw his arms over her shoulders toward Sheldon.

"Shellen do it! Shellen do it!"

The almost identical looks of horror that appeared on both Penny and Sheldon's faces made Leonard dangerously close to laughing out loud. His desire to live was the only thing that prevented it.

* * *

End Author's Notes

For the record, Sheldon did not do it.

If you're wondering what a Sing-a-ma-jig is, look it up. They're absurdly adorable.


	5. The Firefly Effect

Author's Notes

For Taya.

* * *

**The Firefly Effect**

_Continuity: Season 4, just after "The Irish Pub Formulation."_

* * *

"Oh, son of a _bitch_!"

Penny jerked in surprise, the brush applicator she held pinched between her thumb and index finger missing its mark to instead jolt across the back of her hand, leaving a streak of fuchsia behind. She also managed to topple the bottle of nail polish sitting beside her.

Mumbling curses under her breath, she snatched up some tissues and began sponging at the gooey puddle before it stained her coffee table. By the time she was done scrubbing, there were still little flecks of glitter sparkling up at her from between the grooves in the wood, but she could live with it. After all, there was a discolored orange blob barely four inches to the left of it, and she didn't even know what that was from.

That crisis averted, Penny blew her bangs from out of her eyes and glanced warily at her front door. The shout had come from the boys' apartment. Experience—hell, _common sense_—told her she was better off just staying on her couch and pouring herself another glass of red wine, but curiosity was getting the best of her.

With another, deeper sigh, she gave in and padded barefoot across the hall, knocking on Leonard and Sheldon's door with her fuchsia-tinted knuckles before letting herself in.

They were all huddled around a laptop Howard had open in front of him, staring at whatever the screen was showing them with expressions that were interesting mishmashes of dejection and disgust.

"What's going on?"

Leonard's head was the only one to snap up at the sound of her voice. His lips moved soundlessly for a moment, making him look like a fish, before he finally was able to choke out, "They—they cancelled _Caprica_!"

Penny blinked. He didn't seem about to elaborate, which was strange since Leonard, at least, could normally distinguish what she would understand and what she needed English subtitles for. "Sweetie, I know it's been a few years, but I'm not quite fluent in nerd. What's a caprica?" she prompted.

Either they were ignoring her, or they were too concerned with what they saw on the computer again to hear her.

Sheldon threw up his hands and stalked over to his spot, slumping into the cushions and scowling like a child on the verge of throwing a monster of a temper tantrum. "Good Lord! It's _Firefly_ all over again."

"I just don't understand it," Leonard was shaking his head.

Scraping together the bits and pieces that made any kind of sense to her, Penny ventured, "So, you guys are mad because they cancelled a TV show?"

"Not just any TV show," Howard corrected her, shutting and putting the laptop aside as he did, "one of the best science fiction dramas to ever come along since _Dr. Who_."

Raj cupped his hands around his mouth and whispered something into Howard's ear.

"Yes, yes, I know the formula broke the mold! I'm comparing it on the grounds of originality, not similitude."

"At this point, I'm of the opinion that a room of capuchin monkeys would be more qualified to slate SyFy's programming," Sheldon added sulkily.

"I understand. I was pretty upset when they yanked _Las Vegas_ off the air. On a cliffhanger too, with Delinda bleeding out at the funeral and everything!"

Four pairs of eyes turned to look at her.

"What? I'm just trying to be sympathetic."

"You've got to admit, it's not_ quite_ the same," Leonard said blandly.

Penny rolled her eyes and spun on her heel to go back to her apartment, wondering why she didn't just listen to the niggling voice that had warned her not to come over.

After she left, Howard, Raj, Leonard, and Sheldon sat wallowing, none of them touching their already cold food.

Raj was the one who finally broke the dismal silence. "I still want to know what happened to Danny and Delinda's baby!"

* * *

End Author's Notes 

Set this in a car, throw in a little more horn-blaring and a lot more screaming, and this was pretty much my reaction when ABC cancelled _Pushing Daisies_.


	6. The Happily Ever After Complex Phenomena

Author's Notes

Speaking of when worlds collide…

* * *

**The Happily Ever After Complex Phenomena**

_Continuity: Season 4, between "The Benefactor Factor" and "__The Cohabitation Formulation."_

* * *

"_Wait a minute...nice boys don't kiss like that."_

"_Oh yes, they fucking do."_

A sound somewhere between a wail and a watery squeal erupted from Bernadette while she flailed a finger hysterically at the television screen. "Look, look! He's wrapping her up in his coat with him!"

"Awww!"

They'd decided to make Friday evening a girls' night in to be spent shamelessly hunkered down in Penny's living room with a stack of the sappiest chick flicks Vidéothèque had to offer (which was surprisingly quite a few, considering it was Valentine's Day weekend), pizza, and a bottle of wine.

Which turned into four bottles of wine.

Which turned into three girls in various degrees of drunkenness bawling over _Bridget Jones's Diary, _balled up tissues, and cold pizza crusts by 11:25 p.m.

"Ugh, I thought these were supposed to be romantic _comedies_?" Penny muttered, swiping at her face with the end of her pajama sleeve. More often than not tonight, she had caught her train of thought wandering across the hall to another _nice boy_, one whose heart she had stomped on all because she was too much of a coward. "Why the hell do we do this to ourselves?"

Amy's hand shot into the air like an overeager student trying to answer the teacher's question. "I got this, bestie." Though she'd had the least to drink, she was slurring slightly, with her tongue reduced to a foreign object in her mouth that she was attempting to speak around instead of with. "You see, our culture has pressured girls to feel from a very young age the importance of finding love and how our happiness is inherently dependent on it."

Bernadette was nodding, but her contemplative expression was cancelled out by the fact that her glasses were sitting lopsidedly on the bridge of her nose.

"We've been exposed to it our whole lives. Books, films, music. So much, that we don't even realize it half of the time, and we just go along, letting ourselves be spoon-fed these destructive, soul-crushing perceptions by society. And you wanna know who I blame?" she said, jabbing a finger. "That son of bitch Walt Disney. He starts in on us when we're at our most impressionable, seducing us with magic-laced kisses and adorable woodland creatures who know their way around a mop, and then it's all downhill from there!" Amy hiccupped. "I like to call it the Happily Ever After Complex Phenomena."

Penny steadied herself with the back of the sofa. "Are you telling me I'm so screwed up over guys because of _The Little Mermaid_?"

"Among others. Jane Austen's certainly no innocent."

"Ooh, can we watch _Pride and Prejudice_ next?" Bernadette asked, her crying jag suddenly over and forgotten as she bounced upright in the armchair. "I could go for some more Colin Firth."

"Which is funny," Amy continued like she hadn't been interrupted, "because gentle-bred ladies in the British Regency era were definitely not encouraged to be romantic as a rule. Who could be when your mother sat you down the night before your arranged marriage to Lord Dooseldorf—a man who was twenty years your senior and smelled faintly of horse sweat—and advised you to get through your wifely duties with a less-than-helpful 'close your eyes and think of England'?"

Penny stared at the ceiling, then tipped backed her glass to polish off her wine only to discover it was already empty. Sad.

)(

The next morning, Penny woke up with a mouth that felt full of sand and the harsh light of day glaring in her eyes like the sun hated her damn guts. And right now, she hated the sun right back.

She was dimly aware of Bernadette's snuffling little snores filtering under the crack beneath her bedroom door from the living room. Jerking to one side to bury herself more deeply under the covers, Penny squeezed her eyes tightly shut as her head gave a particularly agonizing throb.

"Oh, _God_."

"Penny," came rasping from the floor.

She pathetically crawled to the side of her mattress to peer over the edge and found Amy, her hair doing amazing acrobatic feats, propped up on her elbows amid a nest of blankets and pillows.

"While your voice would normally bring to mind a heavenly choir of angels, at this moment, it's making me want to end it all by sticking a fork into an electrical socket. Could you please just _shhhhh_…" She passed out cold again mid-shush.

Penny rolled over onto her back and threw the duvet over her pounding head. "We're renting slasher movies next time."

* * *

End Author's Notes

…I can't even keep Darcy out of my non-_Pride & Prejudice_ stories. _Jesus._


End file.
